


Baby, Gotta Say It

by middyblue (daisyblaine)



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Canon Compliant, Cunnilingus, Episode: s07e02 New York New York, F/F, Face-Sitting, Getting Together, POV Stevie Budd, Pining, Post-Canon, Road Trips, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 05:42:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28826154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisyblaine/pseuds/middyblue
Summary: Several months after they hooked up at the wedding, Stevie and Alexis go for a drive.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Stevie Budd & David Rose, Stevie Budd/Alexis Rose
Comments: 16
Kudos: 83
Collections: Schitt's Creek Season 7





	Baby, Gotta Say It

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [SCSeason7](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/SCSeason7) collection. 



> 7x02: Business takes Stevie to New York for the first time since most of the Roses left town. She and Alexis agree to hang out, and they finally discuss what happened between them the night of David and Patrick's wedding, which they haven't talked about since that night.
> 
> Thanks for the prompt! I didn't quite get them to New York, but I hope being on their way via Schenectady is close enough! Title comes from Hayley Kiyoko's [What I Need](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YynKelHGhNc).

David  
  
**Today** 4:15 PM I need you to do me a favor and I need us to get past your initial refusal as quickly as possible please  
I'm working  
You're clearly not.  
You’re either getting an iced coffee or making a restroom stop after said coffee  
Have I told you lately that I hate you  
Patrick says that's just your way of expressing positive emotions  
Liar. He likes me more than he likes you, anyway.  
HE'S MY HUSBAND  
Lol  
Fine what?  
Wait  
No.  
Okay great so you're going past Rochester right?  
I already don't like this  
I may or may not need you to pick someone up from the airport for me.  
I'm gonna go ahead and say hell no  
Save yourself the pitch  
Alexis’s flight from LA was grounded in the armpit of New York State and she has to get to NYC by tomorrow morning but NO ONE IS FLYING THERE because they’re getting snow or ice or armageddon or something idk I stopped listening  
I know you have a whole awkward thing with her but you like her right? Like as a person  
Don't answer that  
You like ME  
Don't answer that either  
Hi Stevie, this is Patrick. David told me to tell you that you like me and that I would consider it a huge favor to me if you could do this favor for him. (But really if you can’t do it we can tell her to get an uber to a hotel or something. If she can’t get to the city for her meeting in the morning then I doubt her client can.)  
There's a series of texts on Stevie's phone from David, begging her to do a favor for him. She shoots him down immediately, and again with a HELL NO when he tells her that what he needs is for her to pick someone up at the airport, and then he sends a bunch of text messages in a row explaining that Alexis's flight was grounded in Rochester, NY, but that she has a client meeting in the morning, and could Stevie please pick her up on her way by Rochester? Ultimately, he gets Patrick to ask the favor, and she can't come up with a response.

Stevie tosses her phone onto the passenger seat in a fit of pique and then sighs, pulling one foot up onto her seat to hug her knee. She’d pulled into this rest stop outside Buffalo because it’s the only one along the RMG route through upstate New York to the city that has a Starbucks and also reliably stocks the dill pickle Lay’s chips that she loves, and now she’s seriously regretting giving into the craving. 

If she hadn’t responded to David, she could’ve pretended that she was driving the whole way through to the motel outside Schenectady; she could’ve pretended not to know that Alexis was stranded in Rochester until it was too late to be the one responsible for rescuing her. 

Her phone lights up again and she bites at her thumbnail before she realizes what she’s doing and stops, remembering the gentle touch of Alexis’s cool hand on her wrist. _Babe, no_ , she’d said, and folded Stevie’s hand in hers like it was something precious despite the ragged nail. 

Her phone lights up again with another message and she shakes out her hand before she picks it up again. 

David  
  
**Today** 4:32 PM Her flight lands in 40min  
Can you do it or not?  
Fine.  
Thank you.  
David: Her flight lands in forty minutes. Can you do it or not? Stevie: Fine. David: Thank you.

It’s not like she can just tell him, _No, the “whole awkward thing” is that I haven’t talked to her in months because we fucked and I’m a coward_. She'd rather die. She’d rather admit to him that she was the one who spilled salsa on the hem of his fuzzy sweater (she was cold and it looked cozy; it ended up being itchy as hell, so it wasn’t even worth it). So she exits her Google Maps directions to the Schenectady motel and pulls up the directions to the Rochester airport instead. _43 minutes_ , it says. 

“Fuck.” 

David probably knows, at least, that they haven’t talked since Alexis left, or even since the wedding, really. Alexis must have mentioned it to him, because she’s a braver person than Stevie is in every way. But until today he hasn’t said anything about it, so Stevie hasn’t had to acknowledge it. 

It’s just a thing that she doesn’t think about until she sees Alexis’s name on her phone, or until David mentions her in passing; she tucks it away where she keeps the loneliness, the RMG insecurity and missing Aunt Maureen and the petty, petty jealousy that David gets to have the happy ending, that she’s the unnecessary sidecar to his relationship with Patrick. That she had a full life, for a while, and then at its nadir it was suddenly halved. 

That’s all tucked away and she doesn’t look at it, and if she never thinks about it then it never touches her day-to-day life, and that’s how she lives with it: she doesn’t. 

She looks around her car and there’s detritus from her road trips all around: empty cheeseburger cartons, empty french fry cartons, empty coffee cups and soda cups (does she eat too much junk food?); a half-eaten bag of David’s candy; mail that she’d picked up and then hadn’t had time to go through; a single flip-flop; a broken umbrella. 

She tries to picture Alexis sitting there in the passenger seat, her expensively-heeled feet buried under fast food trash, and something like shame creeps up the back of her neck. 

With David and Patrick she really doesn’t care; neither of them expect anything better from her and, honestly, all three of them have probably just stopped noticing the mess. 

But Alexis would notice. 

She’d notice and she wouldn’t say anything mean, really, just murmur, _Oh, babe._

And then she’d launch into a vaguely-related story about a celebrity whom she’d convinced to hire a housekeeper or something and look at Stevie like she gets it, like she’s not pitying or shaming but _understanding_ , and Stevie can’t take that right now. 

She can’t take seeing Alexis again for the first time since she left for New York and Alexis being _understanding_ about what a mess Stevie’s life is. 

She finds a plastic bag crumpled up in the back seat and starts stuffing the food trash in, faster and faster because Alexis’s flight lands in thirty-something minutes now and she might be almost an hour away if traffic picks up and there’s always a wait at the arrivals doors and she’s failing at this already, fuck; faster and faster she moves until she’s filled that bag and finds another and starts filling that one too, not just food trash but also the flip-flop that’s been in here for at least three years with its mate long since lost and the unusable broken umbrella and dead leaves tracked on the floor until suddenly it’s clean, or clean-ish, and she’s panting bent over the seats with plastic bags of trash at her feet. 

Unjacketed and quickly regretting it in the February frigidity, she takes the bags and hurries over to stuff them in one of the trash cans on the sidewalk lining the parking lot. There are people all around her, stopping for snacks and the restroom and a break from the road, none of them caring even a little that she’s about to walk (-slash-drive) into her doom, heading towards the literal hell of an airport arrivals labyrinth to pick up the woman whose — admittedly few — texts she’s been ignoring ever since Alexis left Schitt’s Creek. 

Fuck, she is so not ready for this. It’s too big, too opaque; she can’t see through it to the other side, to tomorrow. 

She has no idea what her life is going to look like after she sees Alexis again, or how she’s going to get there, and it’s terrifying. 

Well. Okay. She’s not _David_ ; she can rein in the dramatics. 

She’ll get through it like she got through the RMG pitch: one foot in front of the other, only facing the thing directly in front of her, trusting the plan to walk her through. In that case, of course, she’d had Mr. Rose (and, for what he’s worth, Roland) at her side, leading the charge, or whatever. 

She rubs her nose and gets back into her car, picking up her phone again. _43 minutes_ and she supposes there’s nothing else for it: she has to start heading into the fog of the future. For now she just has to drive the forty-three minutes to Rochester, and she can totally do that. 

So far the RMG has just had her driving across southeastern Canada and northeastern US, mostly across secondary highways where their motel potentials and acquisitions tend to be. This time she’s driving from Schitt’s Creek to Buffalo to Schenectady and then hooking up with I-87 in Albany to head down to New York and have a meeting with Ruth and her team, all on her own. 

And she has to do this with Alexis on her own; she can’t drag David into it, because it wouldn’t be fair and also he would make it all about himself, and — no. That’s not fair, either. 

He would probably be supportive and gentle and un-David about it and it would be _weird_ and Stevie’s a fully grown adult, okay; she’s had hookups and breakups and she can _handle_ this on her own, just her. 

_Just you_ ,Alexis had whispered into her ear, her perfumed hair in Stevie’s face as she tied one end of Stevie’s bowtie around her wrist and the other to the lattice on the headboard, her fingers smoothing up the sensitive skin of Stevie’s inner arm, tracing the veins with gentle fingertips. _Just you and me_. 

Stevie shakes her head and starts the car. The supremely annoying GPS voice talks her through merging onto the highway like she has David-level driving nerves. 

As her speedometer finally leans past 70 mph she runs through her punchlist: 

  1. Pick up Alexis 
  2. Call the Schenectady motel and confirm that they’re holding a room for her, because she does not trust that front desk kid 
  3. Drive to Schenectady, check in 
  4. Write up her notes on the Buffalo and Schenectady motels: things that are alright, things that need to be fixed before reopening, things that can wait to be updated long-term 
  5. Go over her presentation of their current projections for Ruth 
  6. Get dinner with Alexis? 
  7. Make it through the night 
  8. Drive Alexis into the city 
  9. Meet with Ruth 
  10. Drive home 



It’s manageable. It’s fine. She goes through it over and over in her head as she settles into the flow of traffic, watching the miles on the maps app tick down. It’s not an exciting drive; all the trees are bare because it’s the dead of winter, and every exit looks the same. 

It’s funny, though, that none of them look much different from the exit that drops her off an hour down the road from Schitt’s Creek, but none of them are home and they all look flat without her little pseudo-family waiting for her an hour behind the exit sign. 

At one point her music cuts out suddenly as her phone rings; she glances at it, rolls her eyes, and jabs her finger at the Answer icon. 

“What?” 

“That’s how you answer the phone?” David asks, his voice tinny on through her car’s half-busted speakers. 

“I’m driving.” 

“Which is why I called instead of texting you.” 

“What do you want?” 

In the rearview mirror, she sees a white SUV weaving between lanes. 

She has to be careful about speeding tickets now that she’s technically on company time, so she double-checks over her right shoulder to see if she can ease into the right-hand lane and let the SUV pass her. Of course, there’s a line of minivans and delivery trucks, and no room. 

“... maple candy,” David is saying. She keeps one eye on her rearview mirror, watching the idiot in the SUV approach. She loses it for a second, then sees it weave and almost hit a gray sedan just like Patrick’s old car. 

“What?” 

“Are you not listening to me?” 

“Of course I’m not. I’m _driving_.” 

“Well, Patrick just left on a vendor run and I’m all by myself in the store, so you have to talk to me to keep me company.” 

“You really need to get some customers.” 

“Excuse you, we are doing just fine.” 

“For my own wellbeing, I mean.” 

David scoffs. The SUV scoots over into the left lane, just two cars back now. 

“I checked the weather,” he says, and there’s a slow series of thumps like he’s setting products onto one of the display tables. “It looks like you should be okay out to Schenectady, but it might get dicey as it starts getting dark and the temperature drops.” 

“That is… surprisingly caring of you. Suspiciously caring, even.” 

“A, fuck you. B, it would be incredibly inconvenient to me if you were to die in a car crash due to black ice.” 

“Uh huh.” 

“You’re not listening again.” 

“Uh huh.” 

“Great.” 

“Sorry, there’s an SUV coming up behind me and it’s already almost hit two other cars.” 

“Okay, see, this is why I hate driving!” 

“So shut up and let me concentrate!” 

“Wait, I have to ask you this now while you’re distracted so that you can pretend not to hear me.” 

“Fine, what?” 

The SUV comes up behind her, nearly nosing her bumper, and she grits her teeth. It’s a middle-aged white woman with Quebec plates and giant sunglasses, because of course it is. 

“Did you and Alexis have a thing?” 

The car in front of her puts its brakes on and she slams her foot down, wincing through the skid, bracing for the SUV to hit her. 

Her poor car stutters forward as the brakes do their best and her hood stops mere inches from the car in front of her. 

“Jesus _fucking_ christ.” 

“I’m just asking,” David says defensively, as if she were talking to him. “It’s none of my business, but also I demand to know all of the details.” 

“I just almost died, David.” Her heart is _pounding_ and she’s broken out in a sweat. The traffic starts moving again and she eases into the right lane. 

“Oh. Well, did you?” 

“Obviously not.” 

“I meant Alexis. Did you have a thing with Alexis, like, an argument or something?” 

“Why are you asking me that?” 

“Don’t get defensive.” 

“David, oh my god.” 

The white SUV _finally_ passes her, riding somebody else’s tail, and she exhales. Maybe she’ll just stay here in the right lane for a while. The car in front of her is going five below the speed limit, but that’s fine. She just needs to catch her breath. 

“It’s just that she said something about not knowing what you’ve been up to, and that she hasn’t heard back from you about staying with her the next time you’re in the city for RMG. I mean, you don’t have to — _I_ certainly wouldn’t want to stay with her — but you usually at least answer your texts, even if it’s just with a middle finger emoji.” 

Fuck it. She checks over her left shoulder, signals, and steps on the gas. 

“If she hasn’t told you, I don’t know that I should.” 

“So there _is_ a thing.” 

“I’m not confirming anything.” 

“That, in itself, is a confirmation.” 

“God, _fuck_ , David.” 

“Okay, I just — how far are you from the airport?” 

“Thirteen minutes.” 

“Okay. Wouldn’t you rather, like, talk about it before you see her?” 

“You are so fishing. When have I _ever_ wanted to talk about anything?” 

“Can you at least tell me whether I should be pissed at her?” 

“Oh my god, David.” 

“What?!” 

“No, you should not be P.O.’d at your sister.” 

“Okay, well, should I be ‘P.O.’d’ at you, then?” 

“N— I don’t think so. Maybe.” 

“What did you do?” 

“It’s not — don’t make this a big deal!” 

“I’m just asking!” 

“You are blowing this up into a way bigger deal than it is. I don’t even know why I’m having this conversation with you,” she says, forcing a laugh. The GPS tells her to _Turn right onto Airport Drive_. “David, I have to go. I’m here.” 

“Okay. Okay. It’s fine. Whatever it is, it’s fine.” 

“Okay.” 

She slowly pulls up to the terminal behind a taxi and cranes her neck for Alexis in the crowd as she inches forward. 

“You told her I was coming, right?” 

“I mean, I vividly remember you dancing together at the wedding!” David continues, ignoring her very valid question. “You were fine! You were laughing and sharing cake and then I _specifically_ remember you two dancing to that awful Ed Sheeran song that Twyla kept requesting, but after that I don’t think… I saw you... again…. Oh, my god.” 

“David.” 

“Oh my _god_.” 

“David.” 

“Did you hook up with my sister _at my wedding?!_ To _Ed Sheeran?!_ ” 

“Are you more offended by the first part or the second? Don’t answer that.” 

Amid the rumpled travelers dressed mostly in black going in and out of the automatic doors, there’s a beautiful blonde woman in a green hat standing next to her suitcase, chatting away with a handsome cabbie leaning on his taxicab. Stevie hadn’t even known there _were_ handsome cabbies. 

“Fuck, I see her.” 

“I can’t believe this.” 

“David, I have to go. Please don’t bug us about this until tomorrow? I haven’t exactly talked to her since it happened and I don’t want this trip to be any more uncomfortable than it already is.” 

“I — okay.” 

Stevie pulls up in front of Alexis and waves until she sees her. Alexis’s mouth drops open in surprise but quickly morphs into a smile, just as toothy and beautiful as Stevie remembers. The meager shell she’s managed to build since she left cracks. 

Alexis pulls open the passenger door, not even saying goodbye to the cabbie she’s left hanging, and coos, “Stevie!” 

“Hi.” 

“Hi, Alexis,” David’s voice says through the car speakers. 

“Okay, bye, David,” Stevie calls, and hangs up on him before he can respond. 

“What were you two chatting about?” Alexis asks playfully. 

“Nothing. Do you need help with your bags?” 

“Mm, yes, thank you!” 

Stevie pops the trunk and when she gets out she’s struck all over again by how _much_ Alexis is. She’s tall and willowy and looks like she’s just stepped out of a magazine, or out of their motel room first thing in the morning, fresh and made-up, not like she’s just spent half the day in airports and on a plane. She radiates even more than the Alexis in Stevie's memory. 

In her baggy jeans and slightly musty old flannel, Stevie heaves one of Alexis’s bags into her trunk. To her surprise, Alexis lifts the other, only stumbling a little bit to shove it in. 

“What?” Alexis says when Stevie gives her a wondering look. 

“Nothing. Just didn't expect you to help in those heels.” 

“Thank you, that's so sweet!” 

Months after striking out on her own and Alexis is herself but brighter, even in the February drudge; Stevie tells herself, _See? This is why you let her go._ Alexis gets into the car and Stevie takes a breath before joining her. When her door thunks shut, it closes them in together, the two of them in here and the rest of the world out there in the cold twilight. 

After the wedding, when the motel room door had shut behind her, she and Alexis had stared at each other, the potential energy between them coalescing and balling into something with a gravitational force. 

The reception party had moved into the somewhat-dried intended wedding space outside the motel, but its noise was dulled against the roaring in Stevie's ears, and the motel room itself finally became the liminal space it had never been for her before. The rooms had always been fixed in her life as their occupants came and went, but there with Alexis, the materially-unchanged room was suddenly… more. 

They were enclosed in its quiet, the energy between them filling the space like charged vapor. It’s the same now, this thing between them echoing in the air, except this time Stevie knows how good Alexis’s hands feel on her skin. 

“How was your flight?” she asks awkwardly as she pulls away from the terminal. 

“Oh, you know. Fine. Until they got too chicken to fly into JFK and we got rerouted… here.” 

“David said there’s a snowstorm.” 

“Okay, well, I’ve coached someone into landing a prop plane in the outskirts of Moscow in the middle of winter before. It’s not that hard.” 

“Right.” 

“So how have you been, Stevie?” Alexis asks, twisting in her seat to face her. Stevie should be focusing on the road, but she’s never been able to ignore the force of Alexis’s attention. 

“Oh, good. You know. Driving around, setting up motels....” 

“Mm, so fun.” 

“How are things with you? Do you, um. Do you miss Schitt’s Creek?” 

“Things are great, actually! Thanks so much for asking. I just met with a new potential client in L.A. yesterday and I’ve got another meeting in the city tomorrow, so, you know.” 

“Keeping busy,” Stevie says lamely. 

“Mm, hunny p.” 

“You must miss David, though,” she says before her brain can catch up to her. 

“It’s more like I’m enjoying the break from him while I can?” Alexis scrunches up her face and it’s _adorable_. 

“While you can?” 

“Yeah, I mean, if he and Patrick are going to be coming to New York to set up the franchise in Brooklyn, I’m not going to be able to _avoid_ them.” 

“They’re setting up a store in Brooklyn?” 

“Yeah, didn’t… David….” Alexis trails off, frowning. “He didn’t tell you?” 

“No, he — he must have forgotten to mention it.” 

“I swear, I thought he told you, but I’m sure it’s nothing. He just said that they were thinking about using the income from the RMG contract and… maybe… looking at retail space.” 

“Wow,” she says, trying to process this. Less than a year ago they’d bought the house and David had said he was staying, and now they’re — _How had he not told her_ , the jealous gremlin in her brain asks, firmly ignoring the fact that she’s been keeping something from him, too. “I can’t believe I’m actually living in the same town as them and you’re the one being included in this.” 

“He probably just didn’t want to say anything until they knew for sure! And they wouldn't be _moving_ , anyway, so it’s so not a big deal,” Alexis says soothingly, touching Stevie’s arm. She used to be so casual with her touches that Stevie got used to them, but the few months stretching between now and when she saw her last have been so long that Alexis almost feels like someone else now. It's like Stevie's body is still slowly remembering her, cataloging the minute ways in which she's grown. 

She still smells like Alexis, though: coconuts and something else that Stevie hasn’t been able to identify, even after sniffing all of the coconut-scented Rose Apothecary products. She tries not to breathe too deeply but she wants to commit this to memory for when her life inevitably cracks and she needs something good to hold onto. 

She’s not going to have that again ( _Alexis bent over her collarbone, dropping kisses along the line of her sternum, between her breasts, down to her stomach; Alexis’s hair in her face and dragging down, down —_ ) but she can remember this. 

“Is there anything else I should know?” she asks, desperately trying to keep hold of the conversation. “Is Mr. Rose moving to Antigua? Is Mrs. Rose joining the circus? Are you secretly getting married?” 

Alexis snorts and it’s so strange to hear that Stevie takes her eyes off the road for a second, staring at her. 

“Sorry. No. Very, very no.” 

“Are you….” Stevie can’t get the sentence out; she shakes her head instead. “Sorry. None of my business.” 

“No, ask me.” 

“Are you seeing anyone?” she asks in a rush. 

Alexis lifts her bangled wrist and tugs on a lock of Stevie’s hair, the smile on her face inscrutable in the shifting lights of passing cars. 

“No.” 

“Okay.” She feels too hot and also like every single neuron in her brain is trying to scream at her at the same time and all they’re collectively achieving is shutting down. 

“Do you —” 

“So you have a new client?” Stevie interrupts, flicking a pasted smile at her. Alexis smiles back like she knows that Stevie’s deflecting, but she indulges her. The Alexis of now is so different from the Alexis she first met years ago, and this Alexis keeps making Stevie ache with how much more of a person she is: she’s real, she’s empathetic, she’s beautiful; she’s out of Stevie’s reach. 

“Mm, I have a few now! Obviously, the motel group and my mom, but also one of her costars, a hot young thing,” she does a little shimmy, “named Thad Brown. And a TikTok star whose thing is that she sounds exactly like Mariah Carey?” 

“Oh. That sounds… good.” 

“Yeah.” Alexis plucks at her pale sweater so that it falls neatly across her chest. “It’s, um. Do you ever feel like… life isn’t exactly like you’d hoped it would be?” 

“All the time," Stevie says, gripping the wheel so tightly her knuckles turn white. 

“Like, obviously, ten years ago I didn’t hope to get stuck in Schitt’s Creek. But before we all left, I thought….” She shakes her head. 

Stevie squeezes around a sixteen-wheeler and moves back over into the right lane ahead of a minivan, careful to keep the expensive- and douchey-looking car with Massachusetts plates coming up behind them in her sights. 

“You thought your career would be going differently?” 

“I don’t know.” Alexis examines her nails, but she doesn’t pick at them; she’s got a self-control that Stevie’s never had. “David’s life is perfect, Mom and Dad’s lives are perfect, your life is perfect. I kind of feel like… mine has to be perfect, too, you know?” 

“Mine is so not perfect.” 

“Stevie.” 

“Look at where we are.” 

Alexis looks around; they’re surrounded by traffic, the four-lane highway framed by bare trees, gas stations and Burger Kings, Masshole driver roaring up behind them. 

“Isn’t this what you wanted?” 

Stevie shrugs. “I guess I thought I’d get the best of both worlds, you know? I’d still get to be home most of the time and travel the rest of the time. I didn’t really think about how much of it would be nowhere, in-between like this. And I — do you remember Emir?” 

“The motel reviewer guy? Is he still hitting you up? Girl, do you want me to get him to back off? You can do so much better.” 

“No, I was actually going to say that I’m kind of him now.” 

“You’re hooking up with single women all along your route? It's fine; I won't judge.” 

“What? No!” 

“Okay, then, what?” Alexis waves her bent wrists and Stevie almost grins at how familiar the gesture is. She’s _missed_ her. 

“I _meant_ that I’m on the road so much that it’s starting to feel like this is my life, out here, and home is somewhere I am temporarily.” 

“Oh,” Alexis says quietly. 

“Does that even make sense?” 

“Mm. At least you have David and Patrick at home. I just….” She lifts a hand in the air, some kind of shrug, and her eyes are bright. 

“Do you want them to franchise and move to New York with you?” Stevie asks, trying her best to keep her voice light and unconcerned. 

“And take them away from you? Never. And like I said, they're not moving, just looking to... spread out a little.” Always more perceptive than people give her credit for, Alexis shakes her head and starts running a section of her hair through her fingers. “But what I mean is, it’s like Taylor told me after she released Lover, you know, how after each album is done then you have to figure out what the next one’s going to be, and who you’re going to be. I’m just… stuck in that in-between. I’m going to be more than _this_. Life’s going to be more than _this_.” 

“Yeah, I get that.” 

Alexis smiles at her, soft and sincere, and Stevie’s heart thumps, a traitor under her flannel. 

“Are you, um, seeing anybody?” Alexis asks, looking down at her hands again. Stevie feels herself flush. 

“No. No one since, um.” _Since the night you put your face in between my legs and brought me to the unknowable center of the goddamn universe, dwarfing the Big fucking Bang itself._

“Me neither. Well, um, sort of. There was this one guy when I first got back? But that wasn’t really a thing, just a blip.” 

Stevie forces a smile and tries not to let the heartburn feeling show on her face. 

“It’s just that after everything, we were supposed to have our big happy ending, and I’m the only one still… not where I want to be.” 

“Out on the road with me.” 

“Oh my god, no! That’s not what I meant.” Alexis says. The idiot from Massachusetts passes on the right and Stevie fights the urge to flip him off. “I just meant that this was my one chance, and it’s harder than I thought it would be to make it work the way I thought it would.” 

“But you get to travel again like you used to. You must be happy about that.” 

“Yeah,” Alexis says with a laugh. “I get to fly to Los Angeles and back to New York like every other week for client meetings. So fun.” 

“But you’re still seeing the world, meeting interesting people.” 

“Sure, maybe, for the L.A. definition of ‘interesting.’ But you hate people,” Alexis says, somehow knowing before Stevie even realizes herself that she’s slipping into jealousy. 

“Not… all people.” 

“Just most.” Alexis taps her nose and Stevie pushes her hand out of her face. She’s _driving_. “Anyway, if there’s anything I learned while we were in Schitt’s Creek, it’s that there are interesting people everywhere. Probably even Schenectady.” 

“I might actually get to travel a little further than that,” she says, flicking her blinker on to pass a minivan with its trunk plastered in religious bumper stickers. “Mr. Rose wants us to start looking at motels out west near him and I’ll probably have to fly out there sometime soon to set them up.” 

“Mm, fun. Would you actually respond to my text about staying with me in L.A. when we're both there, or should I not bother offering?” Alexis asks, staring straight ahead with a wry smile. 

“Oh, I —” 

“Never mind. Forget I said anything.” 

“I guess I just... didn’t know if I should.” 

“You’d probably want to stay in a motel anyway, right? For business reasons.” 

“Fuck, the motel!” Stevie very nearly jams her foot on the brake out of instinct at the alarm of suddenly remembering. “I meant to call and confirm that the kid at the front desk is holding a room. Can you dial? It’s under RMG Schenectady.” 

“Sure thing, babe,” Alexis says, like it’s nothing, like the fact that Stevie keeps letting her down has no bearing on whether or not she deserves a term of endearment, or like she has a limitless supply of them to give out. 

“What,” a disaffected teen voice answers. Alexis’s eyes widen, lit up with amusement. _That’s so you_ , she mouths. Stevie rolls her eyes. 

“Hi, Ephraim?” 

“Yeah?” 

“This is Stevie.” There’s a pause and Stevie meets Alexis’s gaze for a second. “Budd. Stevie Budd? I talked to you yesterday.” 

“Okay,” Ephraim says dully, entirely uninterested. She can’t tell if they recognize her or not. 

“Oh my god,” Alexis whispers, looking _delighted_. Stevie flips her off and Alexis dissolves into giggles. 

“Stevie Budd from the Rosebud Motel Group. I’m calling to confirm that you’re keeping a room for me. We’re about an hour away.” 

“Oh, right.” 

“So you have the room.” 

“Uh.” 

“Ephraim.” 

“There’s a snowstorm.” 

“I know there’s a snowstorm. That’s why I called and made the reservation yesterday.” 

“The motel’s full.” 

Stevie does her best not to bang her head against the steering wheel. It’s difficult. Alexis gently places a hand on Stevie’s thigh, her palm warm through the denim, and just like that the tension drains enough that she can get her brain working on a rational response. 

“Can you check, please, Ephraim? Stevie Budd. I spelled it out for you when I made the reservation so I think there’s a pretty good chance you wrote it down.” 

“Uh huh. Oh, yeah.” Ephraim snickers and Stevie sighs. 

Alexis’s hand rubs up and down her thigh and Alexis is so friendly in general — Stevie watched her friendship with Twyla; she knows with a jealous heartflip that Alexis can be very affectionate — that she can’t be sure that she means anything by it, but either way the slow motion is soothing and she only wants to wring Ephraim’s neck a little bit. 

The clouds ahead are low and a dark ominous gray, the storm Alexis’s plane couldn’t land in. 

“I wrote it down as Stevie Butt.” 

“Oh my god.” 

Alexis laughs out loud, collapsing forward and then pulling herself up again to wipe away the tears under her eyes as her chest shakes. Stevie’s pissed as hell at Ephraim, but Alexis laughing so hard she cries might be the best thing she’s ever seen. 

“So you have the room?” she asks, barely looking at the road. She can’t take her eyes off of Alexis. 

Emir clearly didn’t have someone like her in his life. There’s no way he would even be interested in a casual quasi-relationship on the road if he had. 

“Yeah, a single,” Ephraim says, bringing her back to earth. “Is that okay? Everything else is booked.” 

“Great,” Stevie says tightly. 

_It’s fine_ , Alexis mouths with a small shake of her head, wiping under one eye with a delicate finger. 

“Thanks, Ephraim. See you in an hour.” 

She hangs up and shifts her grip on the steering wheel. _Fuck fuck fuck_. 

“I love getting to witness the promising new talent you all have acquired,” Alexis says. “It gives me a real sense of familial pride.” 

“Uh huh.” 

“Stevie, it’s fine.” 

“I know,” she lies. 

That night, after Alexis had made her come twice and the buttery light of dawn started drifting through the curtains, instead of sleeping they’d lain awake entwined on Alexis’s little twin bed, Stevie’s shoulders tucked under Alexis’s arm, Alexis’s finger tracing up and down her too-sensitive skin. 

They’d known that they’d have to get up to say goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Rose in nothing like enough time, but that wasn’t it, at least for Stevie; she hadn’t wanted to let go of the moment any sooner than she had to. She’s always been abrasive and weird with hard angles, but Alexis touched her like she was soft and she’d felt close to tears with how _much_ it was, the Roses leaving and Alexis lov— 

She’s not going to be able to sleep tonight either, is the point, and she can already feel the anxious tension building in her shoulders. 

“Um, Stevie,” Alexis says, leaning towards her, her wavy hair brushing across Stevie’s shoulder. “Why are you only going the speed limit? You know the general rule is five over, right?” 

“Because I can’t get a speeding ticket right now,” she says, squeezing the wheel. “And cops are everywhere as you get close to Albany.” 

“Ugh, the worst.” 

“When have you driven to Albany?” 

Alexis just smiles and taps Stevie’s nose again. 

“You can tell if it’s a cop behind you or not by their mirrors. A cop car will have big headlights on their side mirrors, and you’ll be able to see it in their silhouette.” 

Stevie checks the rearview mirror: all sedans and SUVs, no weird mirrors. 

“Do I want to hear the story about when you learned this?” 

“Girl, everyone should know how to identify cops.” 

“Right.” 

“Also, I may have been transporting things across state lines.” 

“Oh my god.” 

“I was eighteen!” 

“Just so I know, are you ‘transporting’ anything right now?” 

“Just your attitude,” Alexis says under her breath. 

Right, because Alexis is drawn to people like Twyla and Ted, who are literal rays of sunshine regardless of the bad shit that’s happened to them, not people like Stevie who are constantly drawn into moods and sarcasm. 

Stevie nods to herself and shifts her hands on the wheel. She made the right call, then, not answering Alexis’s texts to stay with her in New York. Even if Alexis can act like the night of the wedding didn’t happen or doesn’t matter, Stevie still remembers all too well the horrible directed-inward misery of having to still be friends with David when she wanted more from him than either of them wanted to ask for. She can’t go through that again with Alexis. She can't put Alexis through that, not when Alexis is just starting out on her own, her whole wide future waiting for her with open arms. 

“I’m sorry, would you rather be driven by Ephraim?” 

Alexis’s frown flips into a laugh. She’s beautiful always, but her smile is… right. Alexis should always be smiling. 

“‘ _Stevie Butt_ ,’ oh my god. My professional girl-boss side says that you have to fire him, but it would be such a shame.” 

“Imagine if Roland tried to check in, though. Ephraim wouldn’t even be able to get through it.” 

Alexis laughs again and shakes her head, sending coconut wafting through the car. 

“You never know. There might be someone out there for him, just biding their time until they lose everything and end up staying at his motel, not knowing that the person waiting behind the desk is the one they’ve been looking for.” 

Stevie opens her mouth to make a joke, but then processes what Alexis has just said — has she just said — ? 

She huffs a laugh instead of replying, and in the pause they both reach for the radio dial, their fingers brushing as they go to turn it on. 

“Sorry,” they both say, blushing, electric. 

_You are so stupid_ , she tells herself, and puts her hand back on the steering wheel, letting Alexis turn the scanning dial. _So fucking stupid_. 

To Stevie’s surprise, Alexis doesn’t pick the pop hits; instead, she settles on a station playing singer/songwriter music that Stevie doesn’t recognize. 

Alexis smiles to herself and hums and it feels like this, stuck together in Stevie’s shitty car on an interminable stretch of highway in upstate New York, is exactly where home is. 

Sometimes when she’s hanging out at David and Patrick’s, she looks up from her beer and they’re not even doing anything, just sitting next to each other, but David will look at Patrick and _glow_ and look so fucking content, oceans away from her. This isn’t _that_ , of course, but… it could be close, maybe, if Stevie were someone else. Alexis starts mouthing along to the words and Stevie smiles to herself. _Maybe_. 

“With everyone around me saying, you should be so happy now,” Alexis sings under her breath. 

She’s out of tune, but it’s almost sweeter that she is. Even after Cabaret Stevie still doesn't sing much but sometimes, especially if he’s had a drink or two, David will “sing” along to the divas. It’s clear that neither of them has inherited Mrs. Rose’s musical talent, but while David is grating, Alexis is... sweet. 

Stevie’s not oblivious — she remembers tuneless Cabaret rehearsals and a surprisingly debauched night of cast karaoke at the café — but like this, without an audience other than Stevie, Alexis doesn’t perform the words so much as speak them. 

“If you keep reaching out, then I’ll keep coming back, and if you’re gone for good, then I’m okay with that.” 

Her voice wavers and Stevie breathes. It’s earnest in a way that Stevie would normally run from, but she _knows_ Alexis, and she feels like Alexis’s softly-sung words twine through the air, settling on her skin like the soft brush of coconut-scented hair. 

“And if you leave the light on, then I’ll leave the light on….” 

Alexis nods at Stevie, mostly on the beat, smiling, and Stevie finds herself whisper-singing along. 

“Oh, I’ll leave the light on.” 

Stupid, yes. Fucked, also. Very fucked. 

It starts snowing as they get close to the motel, small wet flakes at first that grow thick and fluffy until her windshield wipers can’t keep up. 

Ephraim, tall and gangly and huddled in a black oversized sweatshirt, giggles to himself over her name all over again as he checks them in. Alexis doesn’t touch her but she's very aware of her presence, standing just at her side, her light eyes watching the kid carefully. 

“Thanks,” Stevie says as he hands over their room key. “Is there somewhere we can go for dinner within walking distance? I’d rather not drive in this.” 

“Uh, yeah,” he says, scratching his cheek. “There’s Slick’s, if you go down that way a few blocks. Green building on the corner, you can’t miss it.” 

“Perfect,” Alexis says, giving him one of her aren’t-I-charming smiles. Stevie nudges her with her elbow and nods at the door. “Thanks so much, Ephraim,” she adds as she follows Stevie back out into the cold. “You’ve got the right attitude for a hefty raise coming your way.” 

“Don’t promise him that!” Stevie hisses at her, getting back in the car to move it to the spot in front of their door. “I’m probably going to have to _fire_ him. What if he did that to a guest?” 

“Oh, come on. He’s your brethren.” 

“My _brethren_?” 

“Yeah, all grumpy and dark and stuff.” 

“Is that how you see me?” 

She pulls the parking brake and shoves out of the car. 

“I mean, at first,” Alexis says, walking like a long-legged deer in her heeled boots in the snow. “Not _now_.” 

“Well, that’s reassuring.” 

“Don’t worry, babe,” Alexis says, leaning down next to Stevie to pull her bag out of the trunk. “I know you’re secretly a softie.” She grins, inches from Stevie’s face, and Stevie fights the urge to lean in and kiss her; it would be so easy. 

Instead, she scoffs and says, “Yeah, right.” 

Stepping into the room feels like walking into a beating heart. It’s bright red, with shiny red sheets and velvety red curtains and gaudy red floral wallpaper. 

“Oh my god,” Stevie says blankly. At her side, Alexis is similarly speechless. “I mean, I saw pictures when we bought it, but this is horrific.” 

“I _will_ be leaving a negative review,” Alexis says finally. She drops her bags on one side of the bed and Stevie puts her stuff on the other side, trying not to think about how they’re essentially claiming sides to sleep on tonight. 

“At least we have our work cut out for us, I guess.” 

“There’s the winning attitude.” 

“Yeah, I’m sure my reluctant optimism will wow Ruth at our meeting tomorrow.” 

“Mhm, for sure.” 

“I’m just going to send her an email really quickly before we go, if you want to use the restroom first,” Stevie says, pulling out her laptop. 

“Mm, yes.” Alexis looks a little apprehensive, but quickly covers it with a nod. She backs up into the bathroom, which is decorated with a garish under-the-sea theme that clashes heavily with the bedroom, with little hums. 

Stevie shakes her head and smiles to herself. Literally no one else on the planet could pull that off, and make it endearing. 

She skims her notes from the Buffalo acquisition and adds a few lines about the fully necessary aesthetic remodels here, then drafts an email to Ruth with a general agenda for their meeting in the morning. 

She’s so engrossed that she’s only vaguely aware of Alexis coming back out until she drapes an arm around Stevie’s shoulder, loosely hugging her from behind. 

“What’s this?” Alexis asks, her breath tickling Stevie’s ear. 

“The agenda for my meeting tomorrow.” Stevie bites her lip and runs her eyes down it over and over, because it’s like a law of nature that there will be a typo that she’ll only see the millisecond after she clicks Send. 

“I love this for you.” 

“Hm?” 

“Girl boss,” Alexis says fondly, tapping Stevie’s nose. “Kicking ass, taking names.” 

“I’m just trying not to let everyone down.” 

“Please. You’re, like, the backbone of the RMG.” 

“Mr. Rose said that?” Stevie asks, turning her head to realize that Alexis is still right there, so close that she can see the rays of blue and green in her eyes and the spindly mascara that she must have just reapplied. 

“No,” Alexis says with a smile. “I did.” 

Stevie smiles — god, Alexis is so _much_ ; how does she _do_ that — and her temple drops to press against Alexis’s cheekbone; she must be more tired than she’d thought. But Alexis just shifts a little without moving away and her arms tighten around Stevie in a firmer hug, her face still pressed to the top of Stevie’s. 

When her brain starts to yell _What are you doing_ , Stevie slowly pulls away, not looking at Alexis or the email as she clicks Send and then folds her laptop shut. 

“Ready for dinner?” 

“Hundred percent.” 

On the way out the door, she checks her phone to see a surprisingly blasé text from David. 

David  
  
**Today** 7:53 PM How's it going?  
**Today** 8:11 PM Fine  
Okay good  
I'm here if you want to talk or whatever but Patrick says I should leave you alone, so.  
He's a smart guy  
  
G2g ttyl  
  
David: How's it going? Stevie: Fine. David: Okay good. I'm here if you want to talk or whatever but Patrick says I should leave you alone, so. Stevie: He's a smart guy. David: eyeroll emoji Stevie: G2g ttyl David: eyeroll emoji

Orange streetlights line the empty road outside, snow swirling down in their beams, and Alexis smiles up at the sky, blinking against the flakes falling into her eyes. 

“Who knew Schenectady-New-York was so pretty?” Alexis asks, like the name is all one word. Snowflakes collect on her hat and sparkle under the streetlights. 

“It's not just Schenectady,” Stevie says before her brain can catch up to her mouth. Alexis gives her a wide-eyed look that curves into a pleased smile and hooks her arm through Stevie’s. Stevie tries to keep putting one foot in front of the other. 

Slick’s is exactly as Ephraim described: a green clapboard building on a corner three blocks away, a neon Labatt Blue sign in the window. It’s packed with people and a wave of heat and noise hits them immediately upon opening the door. 

“You get a table, I’ll get drinks?” Stevie yells over the din, her nose brushing Alexis’s hair as she leans up to her ear. Alexis nods and cranes her neck to look for an empty spot. Stevie shoves her way to the bar and flags down the bartender to ask for two beers. 

Most people assume Alexis likes sweet or complicated cocktails, but every time Alexis had come over to her place she’d been happy with Stevie’s shitty beer. Whenever Alexis and David had Stevie and Patrick over at the motel, they usually just had beer and cheap vodka. Maybe Alexis drinking it was just a being-in-Schitt’s Creek thing, but Stevie takes a leap and orders her a beer. 

When she makes her way over to the high-top table where Alexis is waiting, she holds Alexis’s cold beer aloft and Alexis smiles, toothy and red-lipped and crinkle-eyed and sincere, and Stevie thinks that the ups and downs of past few years were all worth it, just to know this. Just to know her. 

When the waitress comes by she’s not Twyla and Stevie thinks that Alexis notices, too, how much less the experience is without her. _Sunshine_ , she thinks. Alexis wants sunshine in her life. 

Alexis is overly cheery and friendly — and maybe she’s just like that with waitresses, not just Twyla; Stevie wouldn’t know — but the waitress doesn’t cede any friendliness in return. Alexis orders a salad and Stevie gets a reuben and then they’re left to their drinks, to each other, to the thick impatient silence between them. 

“So —” they both say at once, then shake their heads. 

“Tell me more about how things are going?” Stevie asks, her fingernail digging into the edge of the label on her bottle. _Please tell me you're happy. Tell me it was worth it._

“Well,” Alexis says, squaring her shoulders, “I am set for my potential client intake meeting in the morning. He’s another TikTok star, but his thing is sea shanties? He’s getting a whole lot of press, so my other TikTok client recommended me.” She bobs her head a little with her hand under her chin and a flutter of her eyes and Stevie can’t help but grin at her. “And then I have to do some research into my mom’s costar, because I got some weird vibes off of him.” 

“Like what?” 

“Like, he’s closest on set to the younger women, like ten years younger than him, barely eighteen.” 

“Oh. That’s… weird. Like, sketchy-weird.” 

“Right? So I just… want to make sure that this is the right move.” 

“It sounds like maybe it’s not?” Stevie says uncertainly, wondering why Alexis would even bother having a meeting with someone like that. 

“Okay, but like, he’s a rising star in the daytime soap industry,” Alexis says, her brow furrowed. “And I don’t have a _ton_ of clients?” 

“I thought you had a deal with Interflix.” 

“I do! But at present there’s not a whole lot going on, not until the summer, really. And I wanted…. I wanted to be able to tell my family that I’m doing well on my own.” She looks up at Stevie, her expression vulnerable, her mouth pulled to the side. 

“Would this one guy change that?” Alexis shrugs and looks down again. “Also, your family’s already proud of you. You don’t have to prove anything.” 

Alexis’s mouth softens into a small smile and she meets Stevie’s gaze again, her eyes big and oceanic and so much that Stevie could drown in them. 

“Tell me about you,” Alexis says, reaching across the tiny table to touch the back of Stevie’s hand. “How is it being the C.O.O. of the illustrious new Rosebud Motel Group?” 

“Yeah, um, I'm meeting with our investors tomorrow. It’s my first time presenting without your dad there, actually.” 

“You’ll be great.” 

“I guess I can relate to how you’re feeling,” Stevie says slowly, still picking at the label on her beer bottle. It’s damp and peels off easily, is the thing. She can’t not pick at it. “I want to be able to tell him that I’m doing well.” 

“It’s kind of fucked, having a dad, right?” Alexis says wryly. Her boot presses up against Stevie’s on the metal bar under the table and Stevie meets her eyes again. “Why should we care what one man thinks?” 

“He’s a good man,” Stevie says weakly. 

Alexis smiles. 

The waitress comes by with their food and just like that the noise and heat of the place slams back into focus, overwhelming, intrusive. 

Stevie’s reuben is very nearly six inches thick and they both stare at it as the waitress sets it down. 

“Holy shit,” she says. The waitress shrugs and leaves. 

“Literally the only person I know who could finish that is David,” Alexis says, still staring at it, so of course Stevie takes a picture and goes to send it to him, but instead of sending it directly to him she pulls up the group thread that died out after Alexis left Schitt's Creek, with the exception of a perfunctory New Year's message to which Stevie let Patrick reply for all of them. She'd managed to avoid group pictures of the night, too, which was no minor triumph. 

But the weeks-old messages stark on their own tug at her. She focuses on getting a good photo angle on the sandwich instead of looking too closely at why. 

Bébé Crows  
  
**Tue, Jan 1,** 12:03 AM Alexis  
Happy New Year!!!!   
Patrick  
Happy New Year from all of us, Alexis!  
**Today** 8:29 PM   
David  
Holy fuck  
[Image to David, Patrick, Alexis] David: Holy fuck

She ends up taking out more than half of the meat until it’s a size that she can fit into her mouth. It’s pretty good, considering, and now she’s got lunch for tomorrow sorted with the leftovers. 

They eat without talking, mostly just eavesdropping on the conversations around them. Alexis hums sometimes when she takes a bite she seems to particularly like, and her toe taps against Stevie’s more or less to the beat of the Top 40 Hits playing over the sound system. 

It’s so much better than she’d thought the night would be when she got up this morning, in the same way that Alexis makes everything better: a whirlwind through Stevie’s life, throwing everything into the air, glittering snowflakes that make even a Nor’easter magical. 

When they’re two-thirds done they start to slow down, Alexis’s fork slowly scraping the sides of her salad bowl, Stevie putting her sandwich down for longer than she picks it up. 

“This was good,” Stevie says lamely. 

“Mm. Good call, Ephraim.” 

“I’m still not giving him a raise.” 

Alexis just raises an eyebrow. Yeah, fine. Maybe she won’t fire him. 

“Can I ask you something?” Alexis asks, flagging down their waitress. 

“I guess.” 

“Why, um. Why didn’t you respond to my texts when you were in the city?” Alexis looks her straight on, unafraid, and god, Stevie wishes she had that courage. “Another beer, please, thanks,” she adds with an ingratiating smile to their waitress, who at least doesn’t frown back this time. 

“For me, too,” Stevie says. The waitress sighs and leaves with the burden of their orders. 

“Not to sound like a desperado,” Alexis says, shaking her head. “I mean, you don’t have to talk to me. But I was just, um. Wondering. Was it because…?” 

“I don’t know,” Stevie says quietly, digging her nail into the glued-on bit of label that didn’t peel off. She shrugs pathetically. “A little? I just — you left.” 

“So? You knew I was leaving.” 

“Yeah, and it seemed… easier to let you go. Better.” 

“To just blow me off.” 

“It wasn’t — you didn’t really mean it.” 

“Excuse me?” 

“You broke up with Ted because you didn’t want to do long-distance. And you… you didn’t actually want… me.” 

“I broke up with Ted because we both agreed that our lives were going in different directions,” Alexis corrects, although Stevie’s not really sure she sees a difference there. “And how do you know what I want? You didn’t give me a chance to tell you.” 

“I know you don’t want me,” she says, and she’s sure. If there’s one thing she knows, it’s that Alexis wants sunshine and optimism, not… Stevie. “And I’ve been through this, with your brother and Emir and Jake. It’s just easier to… not.” 

“You can’t live life like that. You can’t just go around assuming that no one will ever want you.” 

“It’s the truth.” 

“Bullshit,” Alexis says. Stevie starts and looks up at her; it’s so not an Alexis thing to say. But Alexis just raises her eyebrows and repeats herself. “ _Bull_ shit. You’re just afraid.” 

“Wha—” 

“You’re just afraid that I do want you and you want me too and that means that this is bigger than you expected and you’re afraid to deal with that.” 

“I’m not good at this, okay?” she bursts out with. She stares at her hands, her small hands with knobby, wrinkly fingers unsuitable for Alexis. “I’m not good at being… vulnerable. I don’t do intimacy. I’ve tried and it doesn’t work and I just… I can’t.” 

“You can’t.” 

“I don’t know how,” she says, and her voice creaks. Alexis’s manicured hand crosses the table, touches the back of hers; her hand falls open and Alexis slides her fingers through Stevie’s and she holds on. 

“I can’t tell you how,” Alexis says, her sea-green eyes boring into Stevie’s, patient and kind and serious. All the people who look at her and see a ditzy socialite; they don’t even know what they’re looking at. 

“So, what, then?” Alexis sees right through her; her forehead’s sweating; she doesn’t know what to do here, where to go, what to say. She wants this over. 

“So you should’ve asked me out,” Alexis says steadily. “Stevie. There’s no other way.” 

“Mother _fucker_.” 

“Stevie.” 

“Do you — are you saying —” She shakes her head. The waitress drops off their new round and Stevie takes hers gratefully. 

“I’m saying,” Alexis says deliberately, her skin glowing in the low light, her collarbone delicate above the collar of her sweater, “that you could stay with me tomorrow night. And we could go out. And you could give us a chance.” 

“What if it doesn’t work?” Stevie hears herself ask. _What if I ruin this? What if I ruin you?_

“Then we’ll know it doesn’t work,” Alexis says calmly. Stevie meets her gaze again, the steady confident clear-eyed look of the socialite who grew in leaps and bounds in the backwater of Schitt’s Creek. 

“Wouldn’t it be easier to just… not?” Stevie asks, a little desperately. The edge of the cliff is right there; her toes bend into its empty space. 

“Would it?” 

Stevie shakes her head, slowly, her hair swishing over the back of her leather jacket, her foot firmly between Alexis’s. 

It would, in that she wouldn’t be risking anything, but in another way: how long can she live like this? Does she want to? Alone, isolated in the easy chair in their living room, watching David and Patrick become their own little island of two on the loveseat, knowing that Alexis is out there, willing to try? 

“Okay, so, tomorrow night you can stay with me in the city,” Alexis says, tapping a finger on the table. "And we'll take it from there." Stevie wishes she could be so brave as to just… say what she’s thinking. What she’s feeling. How _much_ she feels like this, being the center of Alexis’s attention, trying desperately to see her smile, to feel her close. If she were a better person, she'd walk away. 

“Are you sure?” 

Alexis just smiles. Stevie bites her lip and wonders if this is how Patrick feels daily, swept up in a Rose ego. It’s intoxicating. 

“But how is that practical?” she asks, trying to grab onto threads of rationality. “I’m in Schitt’s Creek, you’re in New York and L.A. It’s not….” 

“You’re going to be in New York and L.A. sometimes too,” Alexis says, furrowing her brow. “You said so. And, girl, you’re an _owner_ of the Rosebud. You can work from New York if you want to.” 

“I… hadn’t thought of it that way.” 

“Stevie. If my dad can change his mind from working in New York to working in L.A. without anyone batting an eye, the _Chief Operating Officer_ of the Rosebud Motel Group can work from New York sometimes. And if David and Patrick decide to franchise in Brooklyn, they’ll be back and forth too.” 

“I guess so,” she says, and the possibility of it whirls through her mind. Letting go of the idea of what a good employee would do — if she had the power — if she could — Alexis holds her hand, and rubs her thumb across Stevie’s palm, digging into the flesh at the base of her thumb, holding her steady. 

“You’re not alone in this, Stevie. But you have to figure out what _you_ want,” Alexis says, so much wiser for being years younger. “And you have to say it out loud.” 

Stevie squeezes her eyes shut, too much; Alexis’s hand in hers grounds her. 

“All set, guys?” the waitress asks, her hands in the pockets of her apron. 

“Yeah, I think we’re good,” Alexis says, her eyes on Stevie. 

“Alright. Take your time.” The waitress leaves their check on the table and they both try to grab for it. 

“I’ve got it,” Stevie says, not letting go, partially because Alexis is still holding onto her fingers. 

“Babe. You drove, like, a zillion miles today. Let me get dinner.” 

“I can charge it to the motel.” 

“I can charge it as a business expense, too,” Alexis challenges. “It’s a write-off.” 

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Stevie says, but she loosens her grip on the check and Alexis’s triumphant grin warms her. 

Alexis holds onto her arm as they head back out into the snow, following in the tracks of passersby before them. It’s at least a foot deep in the street now, and Stevie’s mildly worried about making it out in the morning, but the beer and Alexis’s weight at her side are making it seem like less of a big deal. If she’s late, if they have to huddle together in the motel room for another day, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. 

She’s not surprised that Alexis can walk through deep snow in tights and heeled boots. She’s so much taller than Stevie with heels on versus Stevie’s sneakers, but unlike David she doesn’t use her long legs to leave Stevie behind or make her walk faster than is comfortable. They walk at Stevie’s pace through the snow, quiet and still and orange under the streetlights on a weeknight in Schenectady, New York. Some guy catcalls and Alexis flips him off and pushes Stevie to keep walking like it’s nothing. 

The motel comes up quickly, the walk back seeming to pass faster than the walk out had, and Stevie fumbles the key in the lock with cold-numbed fingers, Alexis’s height shielding her back from the wind. 

It’s dark inside when they finally tumble in, Stevie’s laptop where she’d left it on the bed. It feels like the world has tilted by fifteen degrees since she put it there. 

“I’m gonna take a shower,” she says lamely. Her head is doing that thing like a stack of paper in a whirlwind; she has to wait for things to settle before she can sort it out. Alexis nods and drops down onto the bed with her phone, kicking her shoes off before pulling her feet up on top of the covers. 

Stevie has Rose Apothecary products in her toiletry bag, because she suspects that she’ll be stocked up with them until the day either she dies or David does, whichever comes first, and really she doesn’t mind. It’s good stuff, and half the time she can weasel a discount out of Patrick from guilt of having walked in on them doing something she really doesn’t want to see. 

The shower spits and hisses when she turns it on. She takes a minute to figure out which side of the fake-crystal dial is hot versus cold, because it is always, always the opposite of what she expects. 

_Replace bathroom fixtures_ , she adds to her mental list. That can probably wait for the long-term updates, although that and some paint would be an easy fix to spruce up the bathrooms a little before the relaunch. 

She runs her fingers through her hair to rinse out the conditioner and thinks about the wedding night, Alexis lifting and dropping sections of her flat-ironed hair, smiling at how new it was, straight and shining and smooth, and Stevie had felt like someone different in her eyes that night, someone who might belong in Alexis’s realm. 

The spout dribbles for a minute after she turns off the water and she makes a mental note to add that to the priority list of things to be fixed. Without the noise of the shower, she can hear the murmur of Alexis’s voice through the door, and idly wonders who she’s talking to. The towel is rough against her skin and she adds that to her list, too. 

This is it, though: the hardest part of the night. When she leaves the bathroom then it’s Alexis’s turn and then they’re going to bed. To sleep. Somehow she’s made it through this far, which had seemed impossible earlier today, but she’s still got to make it through the rest of it. 

Somehow it doesn’t seem as daunting as it had. Somehow it feels like comfort, not tension, is waiting for her underneath the covers. _You have to figure out what you want_ , Alexis had said, and Stevie thinks she’s starting to get the idea. 

Alexis’s soft breathing next to her, her coconut hair spread across the pillows, her parted pink mouth, her soft wet heat waiting for Stevie’s fingertips, her squeaking gasps as Stevie hungrily watched her chin tilt up, her whispered _that was fun_ and a giggle, her morning-cold nose pressed to Stevie’s temple. 

Getting up at five forty-five to make it outside before David and Patrick arrived, Stevie’s bowtie now knotted around Alexis’s wrist under the sleeve of her sweater, the smell of sex on her fingers until she rushed back into the room to wash it off, the secret happy smile they shared. 

_You have to say it out loud_. 

She pulls on her pajama pants and a thermal henley and debates whether to wear her bra. Her ribs have an angry red line where it had dug in all day and she can’t bring herself to put it back on, so she doesn’t, and her shirt brushes loosely across her breasts as she gathers her things, a sensation she literally never thought twice about without Alexis on the other side of the door. 

“I don’t know,” Alexis is saying when Stevie creaks the door open. She’s sitting on the bed cross-legged and shoeless, phone to her ear, and doesn’t seem to have heard Stevie. “God, David. I don’t know!” 

“Is he asking about the sandwich?” Stevie asks, not wanting to creep on her conversation with him. “Tell him I am not bringing one home with me. That much meat was not meant to travel eight to ten hours in a car.” 

Alexis looks up and she seems flustered, almost, moving in starts and stops like she can’t figure out whether to put her phone down or not. 

“Yeah,” Alexis says, but it's like she’s answering a different question from the one Stevie asked. “Yeah. Thanks, Stevie.” 

“I can handle him if you want to have a shower,” Stevie says, pushing her wet hair off her neck. Maybe she should’ve dried it, at least to test the blow dryer, but that always takes forever and she ends up with half-damp frizzy hair and an aching arm. 

“No, um. It’s fine. Bye, David,” Alexis says. She rolls her eyes at whatever David says in response and hangs up on him. 

“So,” Stevie says awkwardly, standing in the middle of the room like an idiot. 

“So.” Alexis’s eyes flick down Stevie’s body and she smiles. “PJ time, I guess. Give me a minute.” 

“Take your time. I’m just going to go over my presentation for tomorrow again.” She opens her laptop and leans over it, absently biting down on the skin outside her thumbnail, but she can’t focus. On the other side of the bed Alexis is rooting through her bags, muttering to herself, shoving her hair out of her face. 

“Shit, I think I left a bag in the car. I’ll be right back.” She grabs the keys from the top of the dresser and pulls her shoes back on, her skirt swinging, her mouth set with determination when one gets stuck on her heel. 

_You have to say it out loud_ but Stevie’s never been good with words; it’s how she and David hurt each other, and how she and Emir danced around what they actually meant until they hurt each other, too. 

Shoes finally on, Alexis heads over to the door like she had the day she’d left Schitt’s Creek for good, leaving Stevie and David and Patrick behind in the emptiness of room six. David had been crying and Stevie had almost cried and she doesn't _do_ that; she'd nearly been knocked off her feet with the heavy riptide of _Alexis is leaving_ slamming into her as Alexis gave them all one last small smile on her way out the door. 

It had felt so wrong, letting her leave, but what could she do? 

Now, without second-guessing it, Stevie dumps the laptop on the bed, shoving up to her feet, and crosses the room in strides to grab Alexis’s arm. 

Alexis’s mouth drops open in surprise and Stevie cups her face with both hands and pulls her into a kiss, forceful and still and she furrows her brow with emotion she’s trying to pour into the kiss, to tell Alexis — 

The kiss breaks and Stevie is left staring wide-eyed up at Alexis, whose blue eyes hold oceans. 

“What was that for?” Alexis asks, sounding dazed, which is a minor miracle in itself. 

“I just couldn’t — I couldn’t let you walk away again,” Stevie says, her brain washed-out, watercolored. _Fuck_ , a thought breaks through. _Stupid, stupid, stupid_ , the voice chides, but Alexis isn’t shoving her away. 

“I was just going out to the car,” Alexis says, holding herself very still, like she’s wary of spooking Stevie with sudden movement. Well, she’s not far off, Stevie thinks somewhat hysterically. Half of her wants to bolt, but the other half wants to stay here, caught in Alexis’s gaze, safe in the glow of her courageous heart. _Jesus Christ_ , the voice says. She ignores it. 

“I know. I know.” She shoves her damp-clumped hair out of her face and blinks rapidly. “I’ve just. I’ve been living with that memory of you walking out for _months_ now and I… wanted a new one.” She shrugs, her throat thick, giving in. Stepping off the ledge. “I wanted one where I did something about it.” 

“Okay,” Alexis says, her red mouth curving into a hesitant, beautiful smile, her cheeks flushed pink. “And? How was it?” 

“I might need to try again,” she says hoarsely. “To be sure.” 

“Oh, to be sure,” Alexis repeats, grinning, her hand coming up to gently hold Stevie’s jaw as she kisses her. 

Stevie wraps her arms around Alexis’s waist and leans into her, losing herself to the soft motion of Alexis’s mouth, the intoxicating smell of her, her hands tender on Stevie’s face, keeping her safe and held. 

Stevie shifts her hips, pressing up against Alexis’s, and her fingers push up the hem of Alexis’s sweater, desperate to get closer to her skin. 

She’s overwhelmed with the memory of last time flashing through her mind, _Alexis moaning and arching underneath her_ , and she rocks against Alexis’s thigh, sucking on her lower lip, thrilling at the groan pulled from Alexis’s throat. 

“Stevie,” Alexis says hoarsely, “are you sure?” 

“If,” she says, scrunching her forehead as she tries to string the words together, “if we do this, then. Then we’re in it.” She meets Alexis’s eyes, clinging desperately to the hope that she understands. "I can't do casual with you." 

“Babe,” Alexis says, shaking her head slowly, then faster. “Stevie. Trust me, I feel the exact same.” 

“Okay,” she says in a relieved rush. “Okay.” 

She kisses Alexis again, her fingers tightening on Alexis’s waist as Alexis scrapes her teeth on Stevie’s lip before soothing it with her tongue, her fingers dipping under Stevie’s waistband. 

She reaches blindly behind her and hits the flat of her palm against the light switch on the wall, plunging them into semi-darkness. 

Alexis drops the keys back onto the dresser and starts walking Stevie backward until her legs hit the bed, and then she slowly lowers them both until she’s bent over Stevie, her hair falling into Stevie’s face. 

Stevie’s never been much for being the one on the bottom, but looking up at Alexis, framed by her arms on either side of Stevie’s shoulders, she’s exactly where she wants to be. 

Alexis presses back a grin and kicks her shoes off one by one before urging Stevie up the bed to the pillows. 

“With me?” she asks with a crooked smile, her teeth white in the dim light, and Stevie nods. Alexis holds up her pinky and raises her eyebrows. 

“Oh my god,” Stevie says, rolling her eyes. 

“Pinky swear it.” She presses a quick kiss to Stevie’s mouth and then holds her pinky closer to Stevie’s face. 

“How _old_ are you?” 

“That’s classified. Pinky swear that you’re not going to ghost me again.” 

The thrill fades and Stevie feels herself go solemn, reflecting the serious look in Alexis’s eyes. She sits up and clasps Alexis’s hand between hers. 

“I promise.” She kisses Alexis’s palm, not breaking their eye contact, and tries to put all of her resolve into it, to soothe the anxious look in her eyes. “I _promise_. It was… I feel….” 

She can’t finish the sentence; there’s just so much of it and she’s never been good with words. 

“I think all my life I was waiting for you,” she says thickly, willing herself not to cry; she _doesn’t_ cry. 

Alexis whimpers and kisses her then, a hard press to her mouth that shifts into something softer and open. 

“I was scared. I’m sorry I was so scared,” she whispers against Alexis’s mouth. “I didn't want to hold you back; I wanted you to have everything you wanted in New York. I didn't want to risk — You're sure you want _me_?” 

“Stevie. Yes,” Alexis promises, her thumb stroking Stevie’s collarbone, so close Stevie can see her freckles faint under her makeup. “ _You're_ what I want.” 

“I want you, too," she breathes, the thing she's been ignoring for months, the big thing she hasn't let herself think about: god, she _wants_ her. 

Alexis kisses her fiercely and then presses her open mouth to Stevie’s neck, her collarbone, her sternum above the loose collar of her shirt, leaving a trail of saliva. Alexis’s hand caresses up Stevie’s stomach, cupping her breast through her shirt; she pinches Stevie’s nipple and she grins at Stevie’s involuntary gasp. 

“So, um. You busy tomorrow?” she asks, trying to sound casual and cool. She loses to an incredulous laugh as Alexis kisses between her breasts and Stevie has just asked her out and this is really happening; in Stevie's wildest dreams, she never factored in the giddy floating feeling. 

“Actually, yes,” Alexis says, her breath warm against Stevie’s skin. “My girlfriend is driving me into the city at the crack of dawn so that I can make my client meeting in the morning.” 

_Girlfriend._ Stevie threads her fingers into Alexis’s loosely-curled hair and urges her into a heated kiss, her lips saying _yes yes yes you_. Alexis’s fingers play the hem of Stevie’s shirt until she finally pushes it up and tugs it over her head, meeting her again in a kiss like the brief break was too much. 

Stevie bravely presses her bare chest against Alexis's sweater and she can feel her nipples hardening, so eager for Alexis’s touch, like now that she's admitted it to herself she can't hold back the dam any longer. 

“Alexis.” 

“Yeah, babe?” 

Stevie kisses her in answer; it’s sloppy, not her best work, but Alexis returns the kiss open-mouthed, licking at Stevie’s top lip, and Stevie runs a hand down to round of her ass and her fingers catch on the denier of Alexis’s tights under her skirt, hiding the part of Alexis she most wants to put her mouth on. 

“I really want to rip these off,” she confesses. Alexis nips her lip and then rolls off of her, leaving Stevie bare and cold without her, and tugs the tights off instead, peeling the nylon down one long leg at a time, slowly revealing tantalizing skin. “Okay, that should be less sexy than it is.” 

“Mm, thank you,” Alexis says. Stevie kneels next to her on the bed and lifts the hem of her sweater until Alexis takes that off, too; she drops a kiss on the swell of her breast and Alexis’s hand comes to steady the back of her head. 

She mouths at the soft skin and tugs aside the cup of Alexis’s bra to pull her nipple into her mouth, rolling it on her tongue as she works her other hand into the other cup to pinch and roll that nipple in tandem, Alexis’s chest rising and falling underneath her hands. 

Alexis’s breasts are soft and perfect and her nipples are responsive as hell, pebbling eagerly with her touch, but one hand drifts down to cup between her legs. 

She can feel her own cunt starting to throb and when Alexis moans, “Stevie, Stevie,” and digs her fingers under Stevie’s waistband, she doesn’t hesitate to lift her hips, abandoning Alexis’s breast to kiss her again as she pulls off her pajama pants. 

Alexis throws them somewhere on the floor and straddles Stevie, reaching behind herself to undo her bra and then tosses that also, so when she leans down and her bare breasts brush Stevie’s, their mouths crash together, a violent tide. 

Stevie feels overheated and exposed in the best way, like Alexis’s touch is smoothing away the sharp edges, and when Alexis dips her fingers into Stevie’s cotton underwear, clinging with how wet she is, she gasps and her legs automatically try to open wider but Alexis’s thighs hold her firm, keeping her tight around Alexis’s fingers as they circle her clit, dip inside to gather wetness and return to her clit, lighting her up. 

Alexis mouths at Stevie’s neck until Stevie gasps, “No hickeys!” and she moves to Stevie’s shoulder, her teeth resting on the muscle as she grinds her wet cunt into Stevie’s thigh, her fingers relentless on Stevie’s clit. 

Stevie massages Alexis’s breast, panting hotly into her neck, pinching her nipple, relishing the heave of her chest as Alexis’s fingers move faster on her clit, bringing her closer to the edge and then slowing just as Stevie’s almost there. 

“Fuck,” Stevie says desperately. Alexis laughs and presses a kiss to her shoulder. 

“My wrist hurts,” Alexis murmurs. “Can we remove the underwear?” 

“Yes, god, please.” 

It could be awkward or unsexy but again something about being here, doing this, with Alexis makes it all so good, so much that the world literally feels rose-tinted. 

Alexis opens her thighs as she comes to crawl back up the bed to Stevie, and the shine of her slick on her inner thigh catches Stevie’s eye and she can’t look away from the apex of her legs, framed with blonde curls. Stevie's mouth waters. The bedspread is soaked with her arousal underneath her. 

“What?” Alexis asks. Her mouth is kiss-swollen and her breast has a hickey blooming on the side (oops) and Stevie can’t speak at first. 

“Can you — I want —” She licks her lips and Alexis presses back a smile, her dimples coming out. 

“Anything,” Alexis says softly, her manicured hands caressing Stevie’s pale thighs like she can’t not touch her. 

As Alexis watches, Stevie lays on her back and gestures, and when Alexis doesn’t move Stevie rolls her eyes, feeling herself flush bright red. 

“Come on, just….” 

“Stevie,” Alexis says, faux-shocked, and moves back over her on her hands and knees until she’s straddling Stevie’s chest, smearing wet arousal across Stevie's breast where she brushes too close, so close to where Stevie wants her but not close enough, her eyes unblinking on Stevie’s like just one movement would make her stop. 

Stevie rolls her eyes again and grips Alexis’s hips, her fingers digging into the soft flesh of her ass, pulling her up the rest of the way so she can sit on Stevie’s face. 

“Are you sure?” Alexis asks, her hair swinging down, not fully seated, her pussy lips held tantalizingly above Stevie’s mouth. She hooks her hair over her ear and then reaches down to brush Stevie’s hair out of her face. 

“I’ll pinch you if I need you to stop, okay?” Stevie says, swallowing saliva, the scent of Alexis _so close_ and then finally _on her tongue_ , holy _shit_ , the bud of her clit _on Stevie’s tongue_ ; she nearly comes just from this, her nose buried in Alexis’s pubic curls, her fingers digging into Alexis’s thighs. 

She’s _surrounded_ by Alexis, her entire world narrowed to Alexis’s soft inner thighs against her cheeks, the wet musk of her cunt on her mouth. 

She thrusts her tongue into Alexis’s pussy, lapping her up — she’s so _wet_ , Jesus _Christ_ — and as Alexis’s sighs get breathier and higher-pitched Stevie tilts her chin up again to roll her tongue against her clit, sucking the swollen nub. 

She’s lost in the scent of Alexis, her trembling thighs over Stevie’s shoulders, jerking inward to grip Stevie’s head between them until she seems to force herself to keep them apart. 

Stevie strokes her palms up the soft skin of Alexis’s thighs to grip her hips, and urges her to rock them, to grind herself on Stevie’s tongue as she keeps mouthing at her clit. 

She keeps hold of her ass with one hand and works the other underneath her, penetrating Alexis’s cunt with two fingers at once, her own moaning muffled underneath Alexis as her fingers push in and out of her gripping heat, dripping Alexis’s wetness onto her chin. 

In the rhythm of it now, Alexis fucks herself shamelessly between Stevie’s fingers and mouth; Stevie flicks her tongue on her clit and she gasps. Stevie looks up at her, her flushed face and mussed hair and her wet mouth open; she’s the hottest thing Stevie’s ever seen, bar fucking none. 

Alexis whimpers and her hips lose their rhythm against Stevie’s tongue as she fights for release, her little _Uh uh uh_ s filling the room until Stevie flutters her tongue and her hips stutter and she moans, “ _Stevie_ ,” her cunt pulsing around Stevie’s fingers, wet on Stevie’s chin. 

“Holy fuck,” she breathes as she comes down, climbing off of Stevie to flop down next to her. 

Stevie wipes at her mouth with the back of her hand and looks over at her, her light eyes shining in the dark. To her surprise, Alexis leans in for a gentle kiss, licking the taste of herself from Stevie’s mouth. 

“Thank you,” Alexis says softly, brushing Stevie’s hair from her face, and then her mouth quirks in a too-knowing smile. “How do you want it?” 

“I’m so fucking wet,” Stevie admits. She rolls onto her side to face Alexis and her pubic curls stick to her inner thighs. She desperately wants something in there, something filling her up, pushing her over the brink from the inside. “Your fingers? I’ll be — embarrassingly quick.” 

“Hmm,” Alexis just says. 

She nudges Stevie’s top thigh up with her knee, holding her open, but instead of getting right to it she cups Stevie’s jaw, coaxing her into an open-mouthed kiss until she pulls her mouth away from Stevie’s desperate lips and slides two fingers into her mouth, not letting her close her lips around them but gently holding her jaw open just so that as she works her tongue over Alexis’s fingers saliva drips out of the corner of her mouth. 

Alexis licks it up with a broad stroke of her tongue and Stevie moans, her thighs shuddering against Alexis’s leg holding them open until Alexis’s fingers plunge into her, Alexis bending to suck at Stevie’s nipple, her teeth grazing the sensitive nub as her fingers fuck into her, filling her up. 

Through her half-open eyes she sees a mark on the back of Alexis’s shoulder and she traces her fingers over it, Alexis’s skin hot and sweaty under her hand, Alexis’s mouth sucking hard at her nipple. 

Alexis keeps fucking her, three fingers now pumping in and out of Stevie’s swollen, dripping cunt, her thumb flicking across Stevie’s over-sensitive clit, and nudges her head up to kiss her properly. 

“Come on, Stevie,” Alexis pants against her mouth and curls her fingers inside Stevie and arousal flickers through her like wildfire. “So good, you were so good to me, feel so good," _please,_ "look at you, so fucking hot.” 

Stevie sobs, trying — trying — 

“Such a perfect girl, perfect pussy, perfect mouth," _Lex_ , "god, I’m so lucky to have you, Stevie, so good," _so good_ , "so good for me —” 

Alexis presses a knuckle against Stevie’s clit and rubs faster, faster, until Stevie whites out, the “ _Oh!”_ dragged out of her, Alexis pressing her smile to Stevie’s cheek as she arches. 

Stevie’s still blinking and winces when Alexis pulls her fingers out. Alexis looks at them, shrugs, and then sticks them in her mouth to suck them clean. 

“Oh my god,” Stevie moans. 

“You alright, babe?” 

“I think you broke my brain.” 

Alexis hums happily and cuddles in close, her leg still between Stevie’s, her arm slung across Stevie's waist. 

“That was good,” Alexis says approvingly. Stevie huffs a laugh and Alexis makes a face. “I feel gross, though.” 

“Yeah, I could use another shower, but can you just drag me over to the bathroom? I don’t think my legs work.” 

Alexis grins and presses a kiss to Stevie’s forehead. 

“Be right back, girl,” she says happily. 

Stevie watches her walk to the bathroom, her ass jiggling a little as she walks in easy long-legged strides, and after a few minutes she comes back clean-faced with two wet washcloths. 

She yelps a little when Alexis wipes between her legs with the cold cloth, then drops it on Stevie’s chest to clean herself with the other. 

The sex-ruined bedspread gets dumped on the floor, along with the washcloths, and then Alexis pulls the sheets up over them. 

“What time is it?” Alexis murmurs, one hand under her cheek and the other resting in the inches between them. Stevie reaches blindly towards where the nightstand should be, but her hand closes on empty air, so she gives up. 

“Late,” she says instead, and drops her hand on Alexis's. "Probably only have a few hours before the alarm goes off, if you want to sleep." Last time they didn't sleep at all, and in the morning light Stevie had felt like a different person, someone new. 

“Do you remember that night?” Alexis asks, her voice soft and vulnerable. “The wedding?” 

"All of it," she says hoarsely. It's in her bones, layered into the mineral. "Even the Ed Sheeran." 

"David was so pissed," Alexis says with a little laugh. "Not that I blame him, because Ed's actually kind of a dick, but it's wedding music!" 

"His face," Stevie says, remembering those indignant eyebrows. "Patrick kept trying to slow-dance with him to 'Perfect,' like, 'Come on, David." She pitches her voice low and Alexis giggles. "'It's a duet with Beyoncé! You like Beyoncé!' and he just kept glaring and making that face like... like...." 

"Like an angry Bert." 

Stevie bursts into laughter and Alexis joins in, her smile all teeth. "Oh my god, yes. Like the fucking Sesame Street puppet with a unibrow." 

"Do you want to FaceTime him tomorrow? We can watch him make that face when he realizes that we did, in fact, steal his wedding thunder." 

"The literal thunder," Stevie points out. "There was actual, literal thunder on his wedding day that we've now stolen. Poor David." 

"Poor Patrick," Alexis corrects. Stevie flashes back to the accidental happy ending and _I thought you wanted that_ and grins, smiling at Alexis smiling back at her until they both break out laughing again. 

Alexis's smile fades first. "So you remember when we went back to the motel room?" Stevie laces their fingers together and they hold each other tightly, like they're both afraid of being cast adrift. 

“I mean, yeah. I’ve sort of been reliving it ever since,” she manages. 

“I wish you'd said something.” 

“I was scared, okay? It was really fucking good and I was scared.” 

“Yeah, you told me.” The corner of Alexis’s mouth lifts in a half-smile. “Why, though? Were you scared of _me_?” 

“I’d never felt that good before,” she confesses, squeezing her eyes shut against the rush of emotion, the mortification, the cracking open of her heart for Alexis. “And I thought there was no way you’d want… me. So.” 

“Why wouldn’t I?” 

“Why would you? I’m not a fun person to be around. No one _actually_ wants to date me.” 

Alexis makes a small noise and her finger nudges at Stevie’s chin, tilting her head up to meet her eyes. 

“Stevie. You’re my _favorite_ person. I’m, like, _constantly_ in awe of you.” 

“Why, though? I’m not like Ted or Twyla. I know you love them.” 

“I do.” 

“Right. And I just figured — you were leaving and you have this whole, bigger life now, and I didn't want to mess it up for you.” 

“But, Stevie. What would you say if I asked you to give up your career to follow mine?” 

“What?” 

"Like, if I asked you to give up your new job and follow me to New York as I do PR for my mom’s coworkers and random TikTok stars. What would you say?” 

“Fuck off, is what I’d say.” 

Alexis grins. “Exactly.” 

“What?” 

“You,” Alexis says, and kisses her tenderly. “You are what I want. Exactly you.” Stevie feels herself turn red; she still can't quite wrap her head around it. "You wouldn't _mess it up_ , Stevie. Did you ever think that maybe this might make me happy? That you might make my life _better_?" 

“I don't want you to quit your job and follow me around, either," she says, deflecting a little, but honest. "You've earned so _much_ , Alexis.” 

Alexis smiles, her ocean eyes shining. Her face is close enough to count her eyelashes, and it feels like the two of them are somewhere secret, enclosed, private; like the motel room, or at the table in the restaurant, or flying down the interstate together in her car. 

She wonders if this is just what it’s like, being with Alexis: the rest of the world falls away. She always thought that was a cliche, some bullshit invented to sell the infinite pulp novels that motel guests leave in their rooms for her to find and hoard away in the back for when she’s bored, but here she is, her lonely world of one transformed into something new and captivating with Alexis at her side. 

“Well, good, because I would say, ‘fuck off,’” Alexis says, raising her eyebrows with a smirk. “I am a girl boss hellbent on dominating the world of PR and no one is going to hold me back.” 

“Good to hear,” she says, grinning with relief. “It’s incredibly attractive.” 

Alexis blushes and maybe Stevie’s heart isn’t cracked at all; it’s like that Japanese pottery that David showed her once, where they glued the broken pieces back together with gold. It feels like that. 

"Are you sure, though?" she asks quietly; she has to know. Alexis brushes Stevie's hair behind her ear and smiles. 

"Not at all." 

"Alexis!" 

"Stop trying to give me an out!" Alexis says with a laugh. "Everything changes anyway, so why not take a chance on something that could be really good?" 

"And you think that's me." 

"I have a good feeling," Alexis says. She gives Stevie a crooked smile. "I don't know what I'm doing, either, you know." 

Stevie blinks and her eyes incomprehensibly get warm and wet and she closes the inches between them to press a dry kiss to Alexis's mouth, soft and sincere, softer than she's normally comfortable with but then Alexis smiles and blushes prettily and all Stevie wants is to see her smile like that again. 

Maybe they won't fuck this up. 

“We should probably get some sleep if you’re going to drive us into the city tomorrow,” Alexis says, rubbing her cheek against her pillow like a cat. “Unless you want me to drive? I’m a _great_ driver.” 

Stevie, because she has heard all of the stories from David, says firmly, “ _No_.” 

Alexis pouts and Stevie kisses it away, loving the way Alexis’s mouth responds, like it knows her. Here, in the snow-quiet dark of the motel room, she is known. 

The bedsheets are cool, their shared body heat dissipating quickly with their nakedness, but they huddle together in the middle and Stevie finds she doesn’t mind the chill at all as she listens to Alexis’s breaths even out into sleep. 

She tries to keep watching Alexis’s face, not wanting to miss a second of her fluttering eyelashes or sweetly-curved mouth, but her eyes slowly close, too. It's okay that they're sleeping, this time. She knows that this isn't the only time she has with Alexis; she doesn't have to guard it greedily as if this time is all she'll ever get. She can rest. 

The wedding night had grown cold quickly, too, she remembers drowsily. The reception had spilled out of the town hall down to the motel, and she and Alexis shared pieces of chocolate espresso cake and flutes of champagne and a spot on the makeshift dance floor on the grass, hanging off each other as they made each other laugh, Alexis a goddess in her white not-a-wedding dress. Even though Alexis was the one with bare arms, Stevie had been the first one to shiver. 

“Oh, babe,” Alexis had said, rubbing her hands up and down Stevie’s arms. “Come on; you can borrow one of my sweaters.” 

She’d been tipsy at that point, having given in to David’s demands for more and more toasts, but she’d happily followed Alexis into their motel room. She remembers staring at Alexis, and then Alexis sitting on her little twin bed, kicking off her shoes and making grabby hands for Stevie. She’d stumbled over and dropped down heavily next her until they were both horizontal. 

Alexis’s arms wrapped around her and held her there, but instead of squirming out of bed like she would have with Emir or David or Jake, she just sighed and held onto Alexis’s hands until the room stopped spinning around her. 

Being held by Alexis after the chaos of the day was the first time she really stopped moving, and she’d felt a groundswell of terrifying emotion rise in her chest as it hit her just how much was happening. 

_David’s married_ , she’d thought. _The Roses are leaving._ Alexis _is leaving_. _Everything changes from here_. 

She'd turned in Alexis's arms, their lips suddenly scant inches apart, and it had been easy as falling to close the distance, her heart drowning out her racing mind. 

Now, at her side, Alexis hums once in her sleep, then is silent again. After a while, Stevie cracks her eyes open; the room is slowly turning dove-grey in the cool light of the early morning, highlighting the perfect arc of Alexis’s cheekbone and the tattoo of a bouquet of six roses on the back of her shoulder. Stevie smiles to herself and closes her eyes again as she tucks her cheek into her pillow, her mind calm and quiet, breathing in sweet coconut. 


End file.
